


O, Kind Hand

by dark_lord_cuddleslut



Category: Hand of Fate
Genre: Age Difference, Card Games, Cuddling & Snuggling, Enemies to Lovers, First Kiss, M/M, Magic, Oral Sex, Sleeping Together
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-13
Updated: 2017-07-13
Packaged: 2018-12-01 16:01:42
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,467
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11489820
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dark_lord_cuddleslut/pseuds/dark_lord_cuddleslut
Summary: Both dead, they met in the underworld to play a high-stakes game of cards.





	1. A Truce in the Desert

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! I would be shocked if anyone was reading this obscure shit, but here we are, just in case.
> 
> This is a one-off from my NaNoWriMo project this year, a series of fics set in the Hand of Fate universe. There were some inconsistencies and mis-characterizations I wanted to fix, in addition to making the project non-explicit. However, I wanted to share the work I had done in case anyone but me was interested. This isn't the most polished work, but it was fun to write, it scratched an itch, and I enjoy reading it, so hoped others might as well.
> 
> For the uninitiated, Kallas is a dead hero that has come to play a hand of cards with a gatekeeper of sorts, basically Death itself. The cards are based on his memories, and the Dealer makes him relive those memories through playing the game, in order to beat the Dealer and his suits. The two of them meeting in a card is unheard of, but the Dealer is a very powerful mage, whose talents seem to know no bounds.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The gambler and the Dealer meet for the first time in the flesh, in the realm of the cards, to discuss a temporary alliance.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is written from the Dealer's point of view.

It was all an illusion. From the stars in the clear night sky to the lingering warmth radiating from the sun-heated sand. There was a warm wind tugging at my robes that swept the stale air out of them. I closed my eyes and sighed, feeling alive again. There were not many things I missed about being on the mortal plane, but the desert wind was among them. It was a similar place that I had lived before I first dealt the hand of fate, throughout the time I'd become obsessed with the Thirteen Gates. Here in the desert, the forge of our civilization, the oldest mystical texts were buried with their authors. Madmen all, feared and respected in their time, now nothing more than desiccated corpses for the Izikurians to rob. It wasn't their jewels and gold I was interested in. Like a vulture, I would descend on the last remnants of a tomb and nearly always find what I was after - scrolls, tablets, runes, maps. Frequently they'd show up in the dregs of the local bazaars, at the bottoms of picked-over sacks of loot, leaving the "valuables" to the wealthier traders. Like my memories, the sand filling in my shoes was an irritating reminder of the world I left behind.

The gambler was hunched over a trader's table, his head obscured by the tent as he bent forward to inspect the peddler's wares. I found myself unable to walk closer, transfixed by his physical form. Before that night, I had only seen him illustrated in my cards, glowering up at me like a woodcut bandit. But in the flesh, he seemed softer somehow, as if I had been looking at his wanted poster for years, only to be confronted with the very man vilified by it (and, for that matter, to discover that he wore ridiculous striped pants, which he indeed did).

"Kallas." The wind carried his name away, stealing the voice from my lips and losing it in the desert. I plucked my cane out of the sand and it led me forward, toward the trader's tent. "Gambler." I saw him tense, and I must admit, whatever fear he had of me gave me a rare thrill. He did not hide it well.

The gambler turned to me. "You." He looked indignant.

"I'm afraid so."

He sighed deeply, releasing a clenched fist. "Come to mock me further?"

"No. Quite the opposite." He glanced at my cane for a noticeable moment. I decided to let him wonder. Immediately, I saw the gears begin to turn.

He tugged his satchel off the trader's table and slung it over his shoulder. "Well, I've nowhere to go but where you lead. You seem to have the first and last say in where I am at any given time, so..." He shrugged and leaned up against a nearby pillar, timeworn and tilted. "If fate has me waiting here in the desert with my host, then so be it."

I smiled behind my mask, and turned in the direction of the nearby ruins. "Come. Our game will wait." I could hear him push off the column, the sound of his boots in the sand, the muted clanking of his weapons and armor. The sound of his acquiescence. "Why did you come to play the game?"

"I didn't."

"Don't tell me you ended up here by accident."

"I don't know what to tell you, then." He was just behind me now as we trudged through the sand. "One moment I was dead, and the next I was at your table."

"Hm." It genuinely perplexed me. I'd never had the chance to speak to a gambler who had not intended on gambling in the first place. There were so many questions; I feared there would not be enough chances to ask them all. "Do you want to win at all?"

"Yes."

"Losing gives you rest, you know. Were you to forfeit now, your soul would pass on to the Great Below. You'd never have to feel that hunger again. You'd never have to fight again, never have to bear the weight of a curse or curry the favor of a priest." He considered it, but not for long.

"You're afraid to die."

"Afraid isn't quite the right word." I said.

Though I had seen ruins like them a hundred times, their beauty was renewed each time I saw them, graced by the scarce moonlight, lit with ever-burning torches. As much as the gambler influenced the cards, many of them were built on the foundations of my own memories. The travelling trader in the desert was certainly one of them.

I made my way to the crumbled remnant of a wall and sat. "I would like to be your ally."

"You've a strange way of showing it."

I chuckled, grinning where he couldn't see it. "Hundreds of years of dealing cards for the damned will have an effect on how a man behaves. I don't make a habit of making friends with my players. There's generally no point in getting attached. When they lose, they're gone forever, and I am alone again."

"You seemed the type to enjoy being alone."

"Being alone, perhaps, but no man longs for loneliness. Do you know how long it's been since I've had a simple, pleasant conversation?"

His brow lowered. "You're saying, you... Want a companion?"

"In a manner of speaking. You're going to be playing for quite some time - I have seen it. It seems pointless, perhaps even impossible, to not form some manner of friendship. Don't you think?"

The gambler looked at me dumbfounded, which amused me to no end, though I did my best not to show it. "You're serious."  
I nodded. "Unless, of course, you would rather we remain adversaries."

"N-no..." He grinned and shook his head. "Alright. Alright, friends then?"

I held out my hand. "Friends."

Our hands and eyes met. I stared into them, hoping to pick up something I'd not seen before. And I did.

 

~~~

 

  
We sat amongst the ruins for hours that passed like minutes, nesting stories within stories, regaling each other with memories that we could pretend for a time were hidden to either of us. I'd never valued friendship in life - there were more important things to me then. No one could possibly understand my fervor. No one would have tolerated my single-mindedness. How quickly I would have sacrificed anyone if it would have gotten me closer to what I wanted. It was such a popular idea at the time that my kind were harmless ascetics. Surely no one who takes a vow of poverty would be capable of horrible things? But I was capable, and I was willing; If it meant unveiling the mysteries I had spent my life in search of, I would have done anything.

"Things are different, now." I folded my hands in my lap, pensively eyeing the gambler. "What I am searching for, only I can find. No one can help me on my path. Now I am the guide, and the seekers come to me to learn the secrets of life and death."

"But what of me?" He opened his hands in his lap, looking frustrated with his own confusion. "I was seeking nothing."

His question stirred me from my wandering reverie. "I... don't know." I shook my head, narrowing my eyes as I looked at him. Something changed in his face. It softened, smoothing out the hardened wrinkles around his eyes. "Others have come to my table accidentally, but they were nothing more than curious spirits, merely a presence, an echo of a whisper of whatever it was they once were." I extended a finger, tapping it in his direction. "You are much more than that."

We were both quiet for a long moment. He leaned back on a pillar and patted his vest, looking for something. "Strange, the things that followed me, and those that did not." He fiddled with his pockets, eventually sighing and shaking his head to himself. "I don't suppose any of your cards keep pipes on them."

I surprised myself by smiling. There was something thrilling about knowing I was about to endear myself to him. Holding out my hand, I snapped my fingers, and then opened up my palm to him. "Looking for this, perhaps?"

He looked at it, and then looked again, standing slowly and walking over to me. "That's... That's my pipe." He reached out for it with both hands. As they brushed against my own, I felt how warm they were. I closed my eyes, savoring the moment for as long as I could, but it passed so quickly. "But how?"

I took a slow breath and shrugged. "How does any of this come to be, Kallas?"

He expressed a quick progression of emotions, pocketing the pipe. "Why did you call me that?" He asked, barely above a whisper.

I raised a brow. "It's your name."

"But why now? Why here?"

"Simply for the pleasure of saying it. It has, after all, been hundreds of years before another has brought pleasure to my lips."

His mouth dropped open. "Did you just..."

I couldn't help but grin. "Ah, we understand each other now."

"Did you come here intending to seduce me?"

"Not exactly, no, but I am beginning to hope it worked." He sputtered, looking indignant, but hardly uninterested. My grin softened, and I beckoned him. "Gambler, I would touch your hand again if you'd allow it."

His feet settled into the sand as he padded slowly toward me. "Only if you'll say my name again." There was always this gruffness to his voice that was present even when he spoke softly.

"Kallas, touch me." He exhaled a breath that shuddered in his chest, reaching out again to my empty hand, taking it without hesitation. I closed my eyes, allowing a contented hum to escape me. I tugged on his hand, pulling him closer to me, and cautiously, he followed my lead.

From the shadow of the moon, he looked down at me, stern and confused. He leaned forward and knelt, the sand sinking under his knee. "Why do you want this from me?"

"Why does a man want anything?" We were nearly face to face, so close that I could smell the old, burnt herbs that clung to the pipe in his pocket. The ale on his breath. The earth on his clothes. I wanted in that moment to pull the golden rings in his hair and taste his scar-marked lips, but how could I reveal myself? What could happen to the game, what might become of the gambler and I? There was so much I had never considered. With aeons to plan, and think, and study, never had I felt the need to reveal myself to any soul that sat at my table. I had no identity. What was there to reveal but the face of an unknown old man? "Either he needs it to survive, or he desires it for pleasure."

"Which will it be for you, Dealer?" Regardless of which expression he wore, there was always the veneer of intensity lain atop it. The coarseness of his voice nearly made me shudder. I didn't know the answer to his question. Instead, I slid my hand into the hem of my robe and loosened the knot that kept my shalwar from falling off. I'd rather not have looked away from him, but it had been so long since I had undone my garments that my hands could not remember how. How many years had it been? Hundreds? Thousands? My hands found the lace of my trousers and tugged it loose. I was exposed, but I could not muster the courage to present myself to him. When I looked back up, I saw that his eyes had followed mine, and I felt my face flush. He had the answer to his question.

"I am not certain this is a mere desire." He wasted little time in taking my length into his hand. I felt myself groan. "Oh, gods, Kallas."

"How long has it been?" He pushed his thumb along the underside, causing the entirety of my body to tense. I clutched at the stone beneath me, trying not to thrust into his hand. I could feel every crease in his skin against me. "Since someone touched you."

"Like this?" I felt my jaw tighten. I couldn't keep myself from looking down at his hand, but found myself nearly overwhelmed at the sight. Even throughout my life before I dealt the black deck, it was a rare occasion that I had the time, the inclination, or the opportunity to share something so intimate with another. "I don't... I don't know." It was rare that I was at such a loss for words. "Hundreds of years. Likely more." The balance had clearly shifted in his favor.

"Well, I feel honored." There was a cheeky grin on his face that I was in no position to deal with, especially considering his firming grasp on my length. "I'll make it memorable." As agonizing as it was to have his hand on me, having him let go was considerably worse. He slid a hand between my legs. I watched it disappear into the slack folds of my shalwar before gripping the inside of my thigh and pushing it to the side, giving him enough space to kneel inside the loose embrace of my legs. With his body against my thighs, I could feel his breathing, and I knew it was only a matter of moments before I would feel the deep hum of his voice as well.

"Only a narcissist desires to see himself in another man's cards." There would be no hiding of the throbbing pulse in my neck, nor the slight trembling of my legs. Self-assured words meant nothing while my body belied them.

"It's not the worst thing you've called me." He smiled, exhaling a very quiet laugh. His hand reasserted itself as he squirmed into a comfortable position. I closed my eyes and leaned back against the worn stone, still warm from the heat of the long-since set sun.

"Kallas." I sighed his name. Even his languid, gentle stroking would have been enough to bring me to the inevitable conclusion. His free hand was lazily acquainting itself with my robes. He would push them aside, smooth them out, sometimes sneaking past the hem to brush bare skin. It seemed unusual to me that such rough hands would feel quite so soft. His were hands that had been thrust into thick leather gloves, hands that had hefted dozens of swords, hands that saved him from countless falls, scraped and bruised and scoured by dirt, worn smooth with age, and scoured raw again. Yet, as they drifted along my skin, I could feel only the softness of the furrows and ridges that time and experience had granted him. I tried to speak, tried to encourage him, but through pursed lips all I could do was bite back a moan. It felt so good to be touched. I had forgotten.

"Save your praise," His voice was almost sing-song. Playful. "or you'll wish later that you hadn't spent it." Though my eyes were closed, I could feel the warmth of his breath against my length. And then, his lips, pursed, grazing against my skin. Parted. The warm wetness of his tongue. I moaned his name again. In my mind, it sounded like a command, but I knew better, and he knew better. I wasn't demanding, I was asking. Begging.

I'm certain it wasn't his intent to oblige me, but he surely had his own wants. There was a moment of hesitation. He wanted to make me beg, to see me on my metaphorical knees, for once in dire need of what he could provide me, and not the other way around. His grasping hand settled close to my body, fingers still wrapped around my arousal as he adored me with his lips. Amidst the agony of insatiable desire, I opened my eyes and looked down at him. Shadowed blue and bloodshot, his eyes gazed back at me. The already quiet night fell silent under the weight of his soft hums, the sound of his moistened lips on my prick. "Stop toying with me." I stuttered.

"I have to entertain myself somehow, haven't I earned that much?" His lips enveloped the tip of my length, nothing more, while he held me steady in his grasp.

"Oh... Oh, yes." His lips were rough from the dry winds. He tongued across them each time he withdrew, bringing them back warm and slick. I reached out for him, settling my hand on the shorn side of his head, with only my fingertips in his coarse hair. Stiff like a horse's mane, and worn in the same style. It was unusual, made even more so by the golden rings tied loosely into it. It was impossible to keep my fingers from slipping into one such ring. For a moment, I possessed him. He took more of me into his mouth each time he licked his lips, his tongue cradling the underside of my length. It was almost overwhelming to watch, but I was transfixed.

I did not feel the orgasm coming, but come it did. My body tensed so tightly that my vision faded. My voice was cut off with a last, hitching breath, my mouth gaping. Looking back, I can only imagine how foolish I must have looked, but in the midst of things, I wasn't exactly concerned. He spat at the sand. Wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. "Content?" I could feel every one of my heartbeats, the whole of my body rocking slightly to their rhythm. I was speechless, gazing at him. My mind was a mess of thoughts; I found myself just conscious enough to struggle at resisting the tug of affection I felt for him at that moment. I could breathe again, and as the world came back into focus, I rested my eyes on him. He looked back reluctantly before turning his head to spit again.

"Quite." I said softly, my hands busying themselves with obscuring my spent prick. I feared if I didn't keep them busy, they would do something foolish. They would caress his cheek, tear away my mask, pull him tight against my body. In my mind, those idle hands were wandering his back, clutching at him as I buried my face in his tunic. But now was not the time for these things. I retied my shalwar and reached for my cane. I wanted nothing more than to bask like a lizard on a warm rock in that feeling of pleasure and affection, but now was not the time.

"Can the game not wait a night longer?" He didn't want to ask it. I could hear the hesitation in his voice. It would be a while yet before I understood why, but for the time being, I could only guess. I knew the game would wait, and gods know it was what I wanted, but...

"Perhaps," I dug my cane into the sand and stood. "But not tonight. We both have much to consider, and you will need rest before we return to the board. I have neither the time nor need. There is work to be done." He slumped audibly against a fallen wall with a sigh.

"There are other things that could use some doing, you know." He smirked. It made me grin behind my mask - how much of my expression was actually obscured, I do not know. I gestured between the ruined pillars, and a tent rose out of the sand. With another gesture, a campfire.

"They will all be addressed in time, gambler." I looked back to see the arcane flames flicker blue across his face, before the desert, and everything in it, faded from my sight.


	2. A Game of Ten Trades

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Dealer pulls Kallas into a forest card, where he has conjured a lavish tent for them to spend the night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is written from Kallas's point of view.

It was a steady rain. Not the kind that falls in sheets, not the kind that roars and rushes, but the sort of rain that one finds reliable. Consistent. We weren't going anywhere, not now, perhaps not for days, not unless the Dealer intervened. Everything was at his whim. My fate, and his fate, the fate of this passing realm that seemed to bend to his every gesture. At any moment, he could wave his hand, and we'd be back in the parlor, sitting in front of that damnable game - out of the storm, but scarcely safe. In fact, it probably couldn't have been any safer here in his encampment, for we were dry and warm beneath some arcane magic that shielded us from the sky. He loved showing off, it seemed. Whenever the opportunity presented himself, he'd be there with an ever-burning flame or a floating apple. I'd seen him pull a campsite out of the earth, a sword from thin air - he had faded into sight from nothing, raised the dead, crippled me with burdens that I could neither see nor touch. All of this, and it felt like I had only been in his company for a few days. In such a trying and timeless purgatory, however, who was to know many days might have passed?

I closed the tent flaps and turned to see him watching me. "I'm afraid to pay you a compliment and risk enlarging that ego of yours." I said, staring back at him.

"It wouldn't be the first of my possessions you managed to enlarge." He deadpanned it somehow. I smothered my grin but I doubt I managed to hide more than a morsel of my amusement.

"You owe me. I was a very generous lover, Dealer."

"It's a rude lover that insists such a thing." He gestured for me to come closer. "And take those filthy boots off. Leave them outside. The rain can't get to them under the shield - though they could use the washing."

Knowing it was futile to argue, I unlaced my boots, and tossed them outside with my stockings, leaving me barefoot on the carpet. "Rude? I'd just like to share in the fun is all. Oh--" I took a couple steps closer to him. "The carpet is nice."

"Of course it's nice! I conjured it out of the ether to suit my tastes. Man could not make a finer carpet." He dismissed my compliment with a wave of his hand.

"Well I suppose I don't need to bother with my original compliments, considering you already think perfectly well of yourself."

"Surely you don't think I'm quite that self-absorbed." Laughing, I crossed the tent and padded up to him. To look down at him, he seemed small, frail even, but I had seen his power. The fragile ascetic guise was little more than a distraction. It made him look harmless. Easy to exploit. He was neither. "Come, sit." He patted the space next to him on the ornately upholstered bench. "There's no sense in wasting such beautiful weather on picking nits." As if on cue, thunder. "See? Even the heavens agree."

"The heavens obey you, of course they agree." He was likely irritated by the oof I made when I roughly plopped myself down on the bench next to him.

He turned to shoot a glare at me. "Are we really going to level snark and insults at each other for the rest of the night?" My eyes flicked down to his mouth, or at least where I was sure it was. He had an intoxicating voice, bassy and ragged, and sometimes the breath in his words exerted itself on the mask obscuring the lower half of his face. It was mesmerizing to watch and wonder what he was hiding.

'We could, but hopefully you have better reasons to keep me away from the game."

"As a matter of fact, I do." He held out his hand, and where once there was nothing, a deck of cards in his palm.

"Oh. More cards. Fantastic."

He laughed, a grin in his eyes. "You used to love to gamble. What happened?" He was being facetious. Wry words in a wry tone.

"I had the misfortune of losing it all to a particular Dealer partial to his own purse."

He laughed again as he began shuffling the deck. "Nonsense. Our game is fair."

"Mm, you keep saying that, and I keep not trusting you." I guarded my cards one by one as he handed them to me. "Five, eh? And no table, so I'd guess Ten Trades."

"You know your card games, not that I'm surprised."

"Could you be surprised about something, just once? It might be nice." I eyed him eyeing his cards. "You may as well go first, I wouldn't trust the balance of a coin in your realm."

He raised a brow at my comment, still looking over his hand. "Have it your way. Two, six and seven."

I sorted my hand accordingly, eyeing him over the top of it. "Not a one." I waited for him to challenge me, but there was only the sound of the storm raging outside. "Six and seven."

"Hmh." He took the two cards out of his deck and handed them to me between two fingers. "Your fives." I handed him the only one I had, and he drew from the top of the deck.

I watched him sort them in his hand. It was vanity to think I could make any sense out of the backs of his cards, but I watched them all the same. "Nine... and ten."

"I've only got one."

"The nine?"

"No." He was too absorbed in thought to seem to take much pleasure out of denying me. I drew from the deck, and was pleased enough with the new cards that it was difficult not to show it. "Two." It was a safe guess. I had to hand it over.

"There's nothing riding on this, is there?"

There was a pause before he answered. "No. Why do you ask?"

"Well, it's just... it seems a waste otherwise, don't you think?"

"No, I don't think. Besides, what would either of us have to gain?"

"Coin, food..."

"I need neither of those things." He waved a hand dismissively.

"Then perhaps I could offer something more interesting."

"You know I can't alter the game in your favor." He chided, wagging a finger at me.

"Wouldn't dream of it." A smirk crossed my face. "Well, I would - and have - but... that's beside the point. If I can't have coin, and you don't want it anyway, we both need a better offer." I stacked my hand into a pile and set it down. "And you've already sampled one of my finer trades."

He looked taken aback. "To reduce such a thing to a bet would be worse than crass!" He protested.

"Pfft. It's not crass. It's... fun. Do you remember, fun, Dealer? I can't imagine you had much of it as a mad mage."

"I wasn't mad, I was focused." I could tell there was a smile behind his mask by the way it creased.

"Come on," I said quietly. "you win, and you can do whatever you want with me. I win, you take of that mask and..."

"Oh, no, I don't think so." He fanned out his cards again, pretending to focus on them.

"And why not? Let's not pretend we don't both want something from each other."

"Pick up your damned cards." He chuckled, shaking his head.

"I'm going to assume that means the bet is on." He didn't answer me, busying himself with his hand. I couldn't look away from him for a moment. I groped blindly for my cards and held them out in front of my face, hoping to distract myself with them. "Mm... your... aces." He cursed under his breath and picked out three cards.

"A four and a five."

"Pick one."

~~~

By the time all ten trades were finished, I was certain I had a better hand than his. I picked a run of cards out of my hand and turned them 'round. When his expression was not shock and awe, I felt a moment of panic that was eased slightly upon remembering what we'd wagered. Without bothering to take the play out of his hand, he turned it to face me with a smug look.

"You've lost, gambler." He set his cards aside before folding his hands in his lap.

"I suppose it's time for me to settle my debt, then."

"I would take nothing from a man he didn't freely give." Sometimes his humanity shone through the countless years of immortality.

"Not even his soul?"

"I merely deal the cards and maintain the rules the game must follow. What they take is not up to me, but chance. Your soul never belonged to you or I, but Fate. What remains is the only possession which is truly yours, from beginning, to end."

I set my cards atop his on the side table and looked at him for a long moment. The rain had quieted, leaving us with the intermittent, distant rumble of thunder. "Well, our bets weren't exactly official, but... much though I don't like to lose, I don't tend to wager what I can't afford to pay."

His gaze had met mine and not left since before I spoke. "I shall collect my winnings then, Kallas." Hearing my name on the Dealer's lips felt like a chill breeze sweeping over me. My fingers found their way to the lacing on my shirt, which I began to loosen, but he stopped me. "No. Not yet." His voice was lowered. He leaned forward on his cane and rose to his feet.

"Yet?" He turned to look at me over his shoulder. There was no answer to my question except the look before he continued on toward the bed.

"Come on, you fool."

"You want to sleep with me... With my clothes on?"

"Is that so strange a concept to you?" He sat down on the edge of the impractically lavish bed.

"Well... Sleep implies sex, and--"

"Who said anything about sex? Come on, then. I've got to put out the lanterns before I take my cowl off."

"But..." I stood, at the very least making an effort to settle my bet.

He sighed, becoming exasperated. "Kallas. I have been the guardian at the gate to immortality for thousands of years. It is a very, very lonely duty. I want to fall asleep knowing I won't be alone when I wake up." I looked down at him from the bedside with a cocked head. "Believe me when I say it is every bit a full payment on your bet." He drew back the covers as best he could, given that he was still sitting on them. It was more about encouraging me to join him than actually preparing the bed. He tilted his head toward the spot next to him.

"As you like it." I had an urge to call him by name, a name I didn't know. He made a brief gesture toward the tent, and everything went pitch-black. "You couldn't have waited until I got in?" His only answer was a little chuckle. As I wound my way around the foot of the bed, I heard the rustling of his clothes - he really was taking off his cowl. I don't know what I expected; Strangers don't quite seem like people until something breaks the illusion. I climbed into bed, lounging more than laying. "What's the deal with the mask, anyway?"

"Death isn't as frightening when he's nothing more than a man." I took offense at first. After all, the Dealer wasn't exactly what I'd have described as frightening, but to hear him describe himself as Death gave me pause. It really was the face of Death I was so eager to look upon. Were I a smarter man, it might have been a more poignant thought. Maybe it would have brought the great regrets of my life into focus, or given me some meaningful insight into what my time had meant before I fell to the great below. But I found myself questioning nothing deeper than what it was about Death that was so attractive.

"Well, if you're only worried about intimidating me, I wouldn't bother." He exhaled sharply, amused. It irritated me. "There's no point in you being frightening to behold if the game is the only law. What are you going to do, kill me?" I scoffed. He was quiet for a long moment. I felt his eyes on me.

"It might have to come to that. Why do you think I never grow attached to the damned? It isn't because they're all insufferable. You're not the first I've shown a liking too, you know." I looked at him in the pitch-blackness. There was not a glimpse of his unobscured face to be seen. "But," he sighed, "There's no doubt of it, not anymore."

"No doubt of what?"

"That I am indeed fond of you." He was certainly not mincing words anymore. I felt my jaw tighten. The heartbeat under my skin throbbed like a fresh wound.

"Show me, then." There was no delay between my demand and his hand finding its way around the nape of my neck. I cursed under my breath. There was a brief sensation of the Dealer's breath on my skin before our lips met. I felt another hand on my face, its thumb gently rubbing against my cheek. When all was said and done, we simply stared blindly at each other in the utter darkness. Neither of us knew what to do. "You weren't bluffing."

"Many of the things I've told you are true." I could feel the vibration of his voice on my lips, the heat of his exhale, the restraint building in his touch.

In the minutes that passed, I felt time slipping through my fingers so much faster than it was before. Each touch was another grain of sand falling to the bottom of the hourglass, every kiss a bitter-tasting reminder that it would all have to end soon. Sooner, now, and again, and still. It was a foreign feeling. I had never seen time as anything more than another currency to spend, and it gave me less pleasure than gold or food. Now, it felt like the only thing of importance. I was holding him against the bed with my body, listening to his breathing quicken, occasional hums and moans encouraging me to push a little further. As I tasted his heartbeat, my tongue at the pulse on his neck, he writhed beneath me. I could feel the struggle between his body and mind; How clear it was that their wants were opposed. When his thoughts asserted themselves in infrequent moments of clarity, I would feel him tense beneath me. He had known the pain of loss and wasn't eager to feel it again. It was too late for us both, however.

"Easy, gambler." He said. I felt the clawing at my back shudder to a stop. Loosely, he clutched at a handful of my tunic. "Don't forget who won our friendly game."

"Not enjoying yourself?" I smirked against his neck.

"On the contrary."

"I'm not sure I see the problem, then." I kissed his pulse again. His hand found its way to the back of my head, tangling in my hair. Mouth closed, he moaned quietly. "I know why you're worried, but listen--" I sighed, cradling his head in my hand. "Life is nothing but change. There's nothing it lets you keep. You can choose to enjoy whatever might be happening now, or ignore it because it won't last forever." We were each a mirror of the other, like paired kings embracing on the front of a face card. There was a quiet filled in by the dull thrum of rain outside the Dealer's conjured tent as we gazed at each other in the darkness. "One mustn't give up even a moment of happiness."

Quiet again, woven with our slow, blind groping. "I will consider keeping this one, then."

I smiled. "Sleep on it." Reluctantly, I pushed myself away from him and settled onto my back. "With me."

 

~~~

  
When I awoke, Death was asleep on my chest. Scarce rays of dim sunlight were finding their way through the forest. It was dawn - the earliest possible dawn. There was only barely enough light to make out his shadow, skirted by the outline of his disheveled hair. I took those messy locks between my fingers, combing them and mussing them again, hoping for the sun to give me just enough light for a glimpse at the color of his hair. I wondered if he had considered that I might wake earlier than him. No doubt he considered me little better than a shiftless bandit, more the type to sleep in; He'd be right on any other day. My head fell back to the silken pillow. The curiosity was murder. I closed my eyes and tried to imagine what it must have looked like, us on our lavish bed, his head on my chest, eyes closed. My mind colored his hair to match his brows - a faded, dusty brown, usually well-kempt, but not today. Not after we kissed as we did. Not after we slept draped over each other like untidy bedsheets.

I had taunted death and tempted fate all my life, without knowing that they were watching, without knowing there would come a day when I would exist solely by their whims. It was almost certain that we would go back to Fate's deck today, that Death himself would shuffle and deal, and I would be just another gambler to drift through his parlor. For now, however, we were little more than an odd couple, a mismatched pair of pawns on the board of an entirely different game, and I had the suspicion that the advantage was mine.

"Mmh," he moaned, stirring against me. "Kall--" He cut himself off. I pretended to be asleep, letting go of a heavy breath. He sighed; it sounded like relief. Slowly, he sat up. As he perched on the edge of the bed for a long moment, I cannot tell you how strong the impulse was to open my eyes! Perhaps he was looking at me, perhaps not, but I didn't want to regret taking the chance. When he put out the lights to remove his cowl before taking me to bed, I knew there was an unspoken agreement. A compromise. He stood, and shortly thereafter I heard the rustle of clothing. "Thank you." He said softly, his voice dampened again by the mask.

I smiled, eyes still closed.


End file.
